The Early Link Blog

When kids think of summer slide, they may imagine fun times at the water park. But for educators and parents, summer slide – or the learning loss that occurs when kids are on break from school – is a big...

Yoncalla Early Works takes a comprehensive approach to preparing kids for success in school and life. For the last two years, the project has combined early learning, health, and family engagement strategies to set young children on a path to...

On Thursday, May 18, 300 early childhood advocates, educators, business leaders, and friends attended Children’s Institute’s Make It Your Business Luncheon at the Portland Art Museum. More than $153,000 was raised to continue our advocacy for strategic investments in early...

The Early Link Podcast

In this episode, we talk to lead teacher Katy Allaback and assistant teacher Carlos Sanchez about Waverly Elementary School in Albany, where an innovative preschool was built from the ground up.
This is part two in our podcast about Waverly's preschool....

Anne Griffith shares the visionary story of building an innovative, supportive and free preschool from the ground up that serves low-income students in Albany, Oregon.
The program has been a success, incorporating families and the community in helping the most vulnerable...

Professor Sean Reardon, a Stanford researcher, was the keynote speaker for our annual Make It Your Business Luncheon. Reardon received his doctorate from Harvard and has spent his career researching how to ensure every child is able to obtain the...

Preschool Promise, enacted by Oregon’s State Legislature in 2015, began serving approximately 1,300 children across the state in September. In its inaugural year, the program is designed to deliver high-quality early learning opportunities to families with incomes up to 200 percent of the Federal poverty threshold.

The goal of Preschool Promise is to reach all low-income children with high-quality preschool programs to close the achievement gap and improve school and life outcomes. When children are prepared for kindergarten with high-quality early education, they are more likely to be able to read at grade level at the end of third grade. Reading proficiency at the end of third grade is a key predictor of high school graduation.

When the Preschool Promise model was developed, Children’s Institute collaborated with a range of advocates to build a program based on national research, lessons learned from other states, and several quality indicators. These partners included the Oregon Head Start Association and the Oregon Early Learning Division. Today, Preschool Promise is an ambitious preschool model that gives Oregon a strong framework to build and deliver quality early learning that will change academic outcomes and close achievement gaps.

As the program launches, many questions remain about implementation, developing and sustaining quality, the role of mixed delivery, the role of the bachelor’s degree for lead teachers, and continued funding. Challenges in the first year of Preschool Promise are to be expected. But as Oregon pushes its early learning system to excel and reach more children and families, it can continue to learn from other states and its own communities about how to build and sustain a high-quality preschool system with an eye on tangible results.

Children’s Institute is closely tracking Preschool Promise implementation and will explore a range of issues related to building high-quality preschool programs in Oregon. Over the coming months, stay tuned for articles examining pay equity for the preschool workforce, strengthening workforce diversity, implementation through mixed delivery, and the impact on families and communities.